TV coverage? When did it start?

GIMH's DVDs thread brought something to my attention, that I first meant to ask about 4 years ago...

When did TV coverage start in various countries? I know a few bits-and-pieces, would be good to get the gaps filled-in.

The first TV cricket coverage was in England in 1936. In those days, though, TV was a rare thing and not many watched it. The first time cricket truly reached the living-rooms of the masses was in 1953, when countless people had splashed-out to watch the Coronation. But it had been growing since the first post-War Tests of 1946. Everything was broadcast in black-and-white until 1967 - the first colour Wimbledon. The first colour cricket was IIRR 1968 - which finished in The Underwood Test.

The first time live ball-by-ball footage from Test-cricket was broadcast from overseas to England was 1990, in West Indies. And a year later, the exact same thing happened in Australia.

South African cricket was never televised before the return, because lack of TV coverage of... anything really... was a key part of the Apartheid regime's hold on power. Nonetheless, the 1969\70 Australian series found it's way onto some British newsreels... and I wonder if any previous ones did, too?

Not a single ball of live cricket had ever been broadcast in India in 1977 at the time of the Packer Schism.

The Packer Schism, of course, resulted in Nine attaining TV rights for all home Australian cricket from 1979\80 onwards. The most interesting question of all is: how long before that had ABC been broadcasting the stuff, and when was the first colour transmission.

It'd also be almost equally fascinating to find-out when the first ball-by-ball and highlights-packages were broadcast in West Indies, New Zealand and the three subcontinental nations.

ABC began broadcasting cricket in the 50s. Around 56/57 IIRC, with daily highlights, though it may have been a couple of years before that. I believe the first live ball-by-ball stuff was 66/67 or so. The earliest I've seen in great detail is the 70/71 Ashes.

GIMH's DVDs thread brought something to my attention, that I first meant to ask about 4 years ago...

When did TV coverage start in various countries? I know a few bits-and-pieces, would be good to get the gaps filled-in.

The first TV cricket coverage was in England in 1936. In those days, though, TV was a rare thing and not many watched it. The first time cricket truly reached the living-rooms of the masses was in 1953, when countless people had splashed-out to watch the Coronation. But it had been growing since the first post-War Tests of 1946. Everything was broadcast in black-and-white until 1967 - the first colour Wimbledon. The first colour cricket was IIRR 1968 - which finished in The Underwood Test.

The first time live ball-by-ball footage was broadcast from overseas to England was 1990, in West Indies. And a year later, the exact same thing happened in Australia.

South African cricket was never televised before the return, because lack of TV coverage of... anything really... was a key part of the Apartheid regime's hold on power. Nonetheless, the 1969\70 Australian series found it's way onto some British newsreels... and I wonder if any previous ones did, too?

Not a single ball of live cricket had ever been broadcast in India in 1977 at the time of the Packer Schism.

The Packer Schism, of course, resulted in Nine attaining TV rights for all home Australian cricket from 1979\80 onwards. The most interesting question of all is: how long before that had ABC been broadcasting the stuff, and when was the first colour transmission.

It'd also be almost equally fascinating to find-out when the first ball-by-ball and highlights-packages were broadcast in West Indies, New Zealand and the three subcontinental nations.

That would have been Sky showing it, I take it?

And hadn't any WCs been shown live in England prior to that? Pretty dire if so.

The earliest commentated cricket footage taken in Australia I've seen, full-stop, is the 1970\71 Ashes, that's why I wondered.

Well, during the Ashes, ABC 2 showed archieve footage from all the Ashes series the ABC broadcast up until 1978/79, and they started with 1958/59. So they started the coverage some time between 54/55 and then. Like I said, I think it was around 56/57. A series against South Africa, IIRC.

It was just daily highlights at that point though. Didn't show full sessions and so on until the 60s.

Certainly Sky's 1990 West Indies coverage was the first time live-ball-by-ball Test cricket had been transmitted home. In Aus I think it was a similar story with Fox Sports.

As per the 1986\87 World Cup, I honestly don't know... I know Tim Rice was part of the BBC sports commentary team, so maybe they did do bbb...

And remember the previous 3 World Cups were all in England.

My recollection of the 1987 final is watching the second half of England's innings on the BBC but listening to the start of Aus' innings on the radio before dozing off. That might have been because I thought some sleep might be a good idea, but it may be that the Been didn't think it worth showing the whole game through the night. Can't remember, tbh. I think at least some of our semi against India was shown too. Hemmings getting rid of Kapil Dev springs to mind.

I'm not sure when live coverage started here, although I know that it's been available since at least 1981/82, which is the earliest I can remember watching it. It was mainly the World Series Cup matches I can recall, back in our beige days

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